Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp
The Royal Museum in Antwerp has an outstanding collection of fine art. The focus is very much on paintings, although the museum also boasts many marvellous drawings and sculptures. The collection is housed in a fine 19th-century museum building in the heart of Antwerp’s South district. The City built this temple of culture in 1883 on the site of the former Zuidkasteel, a fortress which had dominated the area for centuries.
Nowadays, the Flemish Authorities administer the museum. Its roots go back, however, to the Napoleonic period, when it began life as the museum of a typical municipal academy. During this period, the works of art confiscated under French revolutionary rule were brought together as study materials for students at the academy.
Right from the start, therefore, the museum has functioned as a mirror of the historical development of art in Antwerp. The confiscated works included paintings from the gallery of the Guild of St Luke – the traditional painters’ corporation – and art treasures that had adorned Antwerp’s churches and abbeys for centuries, until their suppression at the end of the 18th century. There were rare paintings that had survived the iconoclastic riots of 1566, masterpieces by Van Orley, Massys, Floris and others, and above all, dozens of altarpieces produced during the Counter-Reformation, the highlights of which were those painted by Rubens and his school. From the outset, Rubens, Van Dyck and Jordaens occupied a special place at the Royal Museum. The jewel in the crown is undoubtedly the Rubens Room, which is reached via a monumental staircase.
The nucleus of the collection, which consisted primarily of late-16th and 17th-century works, was significantly expanded in 1840 with the bequest of Chevalier Florent van Ertborn, who had served as Burgomaster of Antwerp during the period of Dutch rule. His taste – progressive for the time – was for early Netherlandish and quattrocento masters. The bequest gave the museum paintings – now internationally famous – by Van Eyck, Van der Weyden, Memling, Simone Martini, Antonello da Messina and Jean Fouquet. Having been founded in this way, the Old Masters collection was subsequently expanded through donations, bequests and purchases. It now extends, for instance, to a group of leading Dutch masters, including Frans Hals.
In its academic role, the Royal Museum influenced generations of artists in the 19th century. Its development paralleled the vigorous revival of the Port of Antwerp, the new-found prosperity of which stimulated a great deal of artistic activity. The city’s academy began to play an important part on the European stage, extending its influence to the Düsseldorf and Hamburg Schools, for instance, and also to Paris. When the elderly Ingres was granted membership of the Antwerp Academy, he donated the customary self-portrait. It turned out to be the last portrait he ever painted. Teachers and students at the academy also regularly donated works to the museum, with the result that the collection of 19th-century masters rapidly began to outnumber those of previous centuries.
At first, the Antwerp baroque – and above all that of Rubens – was the great stylistic inspiration for countless Romantic painters. A good example is the monumental painting by Nicaise de Keyser that adorns the entrance hall. Admiration for the past also opened up new paths, however, and in no way hindered innovation or creativity. The work of Henri de Braekeleer, which is better represented at the Royal Museum than anywhere else, is a perfect illustration.
Towards the end of the 19th century, certain young artists began to react against the academicism of their forebears. These were the painters who laid the foundations of Modernism – an evolution that is also clearly expressed in the museum’s collection. Thanks to a number of important donations, including that of François Franck, the Royal Museum has the world’s finest Ensor collection and has also acquired the richest body of Rik Wouters’ work. A fascinating collection of modern art was gradually formed, including paintings by Flemish Impressionists, Symbolists, Surrealists, Expressionists, Intimists and Abstract artists – great names like Gustave van de Woestyne, Jakob Smits, Constant Permeke, Jean Brusselmans, René Magritte and Jozef Peeters. Not to mention key foreign artists like Grosz and Modigliani, many of whom are represented by exceptionally fine works.
Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp
Leopold De Waelplaats
2000 Antwerpen
Tel. + 32 (0) 3 238 78 09
www.kmska.be
